Review: "Mean Girls" Gave us Peak Lohan (Happy B'day, Lindsay Lohan)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 62 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Mean Girls (2004)
Running time: 97 minutes (1 hour, 37 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for sexual content, language and some teen partying
DIRECTOR: Mark S. Waters
WRITER: Tina Fey (from a book, Queen Bees and Wannabes, by Rosalind Wiseman)
PRODUCERS: Lorne Michaels and Tony Shimkin
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Daryn Okada
EDITOR: Wendy Greene Bricmont

COMEDY

Starring: Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Tim Meadows, Lacy Chabert, Amanda Seyfried, Ana Gasteyer, Amy Poehler, Neil Flynn, Tina Fey, Jonathan Bennett, Lizzy Caplan, Daniel Franzese, Rajiv Surendra, and Daniel DeSanto

She’s been home-schooled since she was a small child growing up in Africa, but now Cady Heron (Lindsay Lohan) is living in a small town outside Chicago, Illinois. It’s time to attend North Shore High School for her junior year, and Cady is a cultural blank slate totally unaware of the social politics of high school students. Even her time in Africa has not prepared her for how wild and dangerous things can be in high school, and Cady learns this like a cold slap in the face when she meets the “Queen Bee,” the most popular girl in high school, Regina George, (Rachel McAdams).

Regina invites Cady to join her crew, The Plastics:” three girls who rule the top of the social ladder. Cady creates havoc in the group, however, when she literally falls head over heels for Regina’s ex-boyfriend, Aaron Samuels (Jonathan Bennett). When Regina sabotages the budding relationship by reuniting with Aaron, Cady joins two social outcasts in a quest for revenge. Cady enjoys both being in The Plastics and hanging with the outcasts, but her fence straddling has disastrous consequences.

Although Paramount may try to sell this film as some kind of teen comedy or high school version of Legally Blonde, Mean Girls is the smartest comedy about teenagers and high school cliques since Election. Directed by Mark S. Powers, it’s a dark comedy and blunt satire of status seeking and of how cruel, hypocritical, mean-spirited, vicious, and two-faced people can be to one another. It stings all the more because we actually have to watch people who aren’t legally adults doing with relish to each other what we’d like to believe only exists in the “adult world.”

The performances are utterly on the money; rarely has a young adult ensemble been this good. Lindsay Lohan isn’t yet showing the chops of a top actress, but she has the makings of a movie star; the screen loves her face, and she looks good on the big screen. Although this won’t happen, Rachel McAdams as Regina and Lacy Chabert as Gretchen Weiners give Oscar® caliber performances, especially McAdams who chews the scenery like a natural born screen diva. It’s the kind of over-the-top supporting performance that makes a film and steals the attention from the other stars.

The film drags during a few crucial moments in the story, and the adult characters are superfluous, like grown ups in the comic strip, Peanuts. Still, it’s quite entertaining, although like the aforementioned Election, it may appeal more to an older audience, in particular because the humor is hard-edged and not the silly fluff teens and most 20-somethings prefer in their teen comedies. It’s an odd film, filled with countless hilarious and uproarious moments, but the comedy skirts being sinister. In fact, you can feel that some of the filmmakers were trying to use the film to send a message.

Mean Girls is an interesting movie, and although it winds down to a Hollywood happy ending, that same ending is off-kilter. The film is not perfect, but seeing a major Hollywood film studio throw a curve ball to the audience is worth the price of admission.

7 of 10
B+

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"Grown Ups" a Stunted Buddy Comedy

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 1 (of 2011) by Leroy Douresseaux

Grown Ups (2010)
Running time: 102 minutes (1 hour, 42 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for crude material including suggestive references, language and some male rear nudity
DIRECTOR: Dennis Dugan
WRITERS: Adam Sandler and Fred Wolf
PRODUCERS: Jack Giarraputo and Adam Sandler
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Theo van de Sande
EDITOR: Tom Costain

COMEDY

Starring: Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Chris Rock, Rob Schneider, David Spade, Salma Hayek, Maria Bello, Maya Rudolph, Joyce Van Patten, Ebony Jo-Ann, Di Quon, Steve Buscemi, Colin Quinn, Tim Meadows, Madison Riley, Jamie Chung, and Ashley Loren

Adam Sandler’s recent summer comedy, Grown Ups, may seem like a family comedy, but it isn’t. There certainly are plenty of laughs for parents and their children, but this is an all-star, buddy-comedy aimed at Baby Boomers and Gen X’ers who are fans of Sandler and his comedian/comic actor friends: Chris Rock, Kevin James, Rob Schneider, and David Spade.

Grown Ups is the story of five childhood pals who reunite after 30 years to mourn the passing of their old basketball coach, “Buzzer” (Blake Clark). Most of them are husbands and fathers, but their families have never met. The leader of the friends is Lenny Feder (Adam Sandler), a high-powered Hollywood agent, who is married to Roxanne (Salma Hayek), a sexy fashion designer. Eric Lamonsoff (Kevin James) is a businessman married to a lovely wife, Sally (Maria Bello), who still breastfeeds their four-year-old son. Kurt McKenzie (Chris Rock) is a henpecked, stay-at-home dad whose wife, Deanne (Maya Rudolph), is the primary breadwinner. Rob Hilliard (Rob Schneider) is a thrice-divorced vegan married to a woman, Gloria (Joyce Van Patten) who is much older than him. Marcus Higgins (David Space) is merely a lazy womanizer.

Over the 4th of July weekend, these five men return to New England and gather at a lake house where they quickly reconnect. However, the great outdoors may test and/or strengthen the bonds of family and friendship in ways they never expect.

Grown Ups has cute child actors playing the children and good-looking (even sexy, especially the case of Salma Hayek) actresses playing the wives and older daughters, but this is about the quintet of Sandler, James, Rock, Schneider, and Spade. There are some good moments of family comedy, slapstick comedy, and raunchy comedy, but the focus is this modern day version of a “Rat Pack” movie. Grown Ups is aimed at the fans of the five stars, but even their fans will quickly realize that this is not their best work.

Grown Ups is an amiable comedy, but is nothing special. It is a domestic comedy with little, if anything, of substance to say about its middle-aged characters. I don’t know what to make of this film, but I suppose that because I like the stars I should be happy to get this gathering of pals. OK, I like it. Although as quality goes, Grown Ups is pretty bland and average, and the grade I give it reflects that I like these guys.

5 of 10
B-

Monday, January 03, 2011

My First Negromancer Movie Review: "The Ladies Man"

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 1 of 2001 (No. 1) by Leroy Douresseaux

The Ladies Man (2000)
Running time: 84 minutes (1 hour, 24 minutes)
DIRECTOR: Reginald Hudlin
WRITERS: Tim Meadows, Dennis McNicholas, and Andrew Steele
PRODUCER: Lorne Michaels
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Johnny E. Jensen
EDITOR: Earl Watson
COMPOSER: Marcus Miller

COMEDY

Starring: Tim Meadows, Karyn Parsons, Billy Dee Williams, John Witherspoon, Jill Talley, Lee Evans, Will Ferrell, Sofia Milos, Eugene Levy, David Huband, Kevin McDonald, Tiffani Thiessen, and Julianne Moore

When I first saw advertisements for this movie, The Ladies Man, I really wanted to see it. I wasn’t just another movie on my list; I craved seeing this movie. From the ads, it looked as if it would be filled with those obnoxious pimp daddy retro-60’s/70’s blaxtiplotation stereotypes that are in vogue, and at the moment, I wanted some of that.

I got it, but in a sort of wishy-washy, screwed up way. You see, black folks can be funny and entertaining to white audiences, if they know how and what to deliver. I watched Eddie Murphy and Chris Tucker satisfy whatever that craving for silly Negroes is to different generations (though Murphy returned from his early to mid 90’s slump as a family movie comic actor). Black and white audiences expect the same thing from their black funny guys and gals, they just want it prepared differently. One group might flock to Booty Call and the other prefers Dr. Dolittle.

The Ladies Man, a film by Reginald Hudlin (House Party, Boomerang, and the Great White Hype) attempts to deliver the colored goods to a White audience. I honestly believe that upon reading the script, they knew that black people would see through this limp-wristed minstrel charade.

Based on an ongoing “Saturday Night Live” skit, the lead is Leon Phelps (Tim Meadows, who originated the character on SNL) as a radio advice show host who gets himself and his producer, Julie (Karyn Parsons, “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,” Major Payne), fired from the major Chicago gig because of his insistence on using crude language to discuss sexual topics (although kind of language keeps television talk shows on the air). During their difficult and unsuccessful hunt for other employment (the first point upon which this movie turns), Phelps receives a letter from a wealthy former lover who wants to take care of him; he must however discover her, as the letter is unsigned (the second point). Meanwhile, the husbands of Phelps many lovers have banded together to find and bring harm to Phelps whose identity is unknown to them because the only glimpse they ever got of him was of his ass and the distinct tattoo upon his right buttock (his unknown identity being the third point). This movie is actually not without possibilities. It is, after all, simply product, and if you make a good cheeseburger, garbage food though it may be compared to gourmet food, if made well it can be a satisfying meal.

When the writers moved Phelps from sketch character to full-length movie character, they forgot to fully develop him. In the movie, he’s stuck somewhere between cipher and character – almost, but not quite where he needs to be. Phelps is supposed to be some kind of fantastic lover man, but the audience must assume that because the script darn well never shows us why. If we suspend our disbelief, we still have a hard time convincing ourselves that his character’s silly “make out” lines are meant to be attractive and inviting to women. Phelps is undeniably dumb, dull-witted, and slow. He has a giant Afro that screams fake like Astroturf, and his wardrobe is porno movie chic. There should be some attempt to humanize him and make him attractive to the audience. There should be something real about him that makes him attractive to women. We can assume from a few scenes that he possesses massive genitalia, but we never see that; instead we see men gawking at his off screen groin area. We do see his ass a few times, which is nicely shaped and sculpted, whether it belong to Meadows or a butt double.

The actors certainly seem up to the task; they’re all earnest even with a bad script. All the cuckold husbands are quite convincing, especially the delightful Will Ferrell (SNL and A Night at the Roxbury) and Eugene Levy. Midway through this movie, you can sense that the actors are ready to bust out, if only they had the material. Karyn Parsons is willing passionate and believable, but she is largely reduced to playing lady in waiting to Meadows’ clueless Phelps. It was good to see Billy Dee Williams as the bar owner Lester. He is as handsome and as talented as, say Richard Gere. I wonder why we see so much of Gere, who has one flop after another, while we see almost nothing of Williams on the big screen.

But in the end, so much is left to assumptions and playing upon stereotypes. One can see in Meadows face the ability to give this character life, but he’s left with a caricature, a minstrel man. When the audience can identify the characters and then sympathize with them, they can better accept not only dramatic situations concerning the characters, but also comedic situations. The audience will giggle at a few situations that they might recognize because they are familiar with the stereotypes. However, a fully developed story with surprises that delight and familiarity that hits home will make for a fine cinematic experience. The writers should take the time to ground the story in reality, not necessarily make it realistic, but give it a sense of verisimilitude.

2 of 10
D

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